Rain-tight exterior junction boxes for conduit are well known in the art and are generally designed to be used with conduit from about ½ inch trade size to about 4 inches trade size or more in diameter. U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/393,202 filed on Mar. 30, 2006, which is commonly owned and shares inventorship with the present application, disclosed a multi-position junction box for use with rigid metallic conduit or electrical metal tubing (EMT). The multi-position junction boxes disclosed in that application were capable of being easily reconfigured into various junction box configurations for accommodating various conduit connections. The various configurations included right hand, left hand, top, and bottom directional conduit installations were obtained by selectively installing a fitting in one or more apertures in the side of the junction box. The external portion of the fittings could be provided with either threaded or smooth apertures thereby enabling the multi-position junction box to be configured for either metal conduit with threaded ends or for non-threaded smooth-walled conduit.
Although the multi-position junction box of U.S. application Ser. No. 11/393,202 provided a single assembly that could be reconfigured into several different junction box configurations, the multi-positional assembly was for use with metallic conduit. In addition to metallic conduit, there are many installations in which it is either preferable or required by the local electrical codes to install non-metallic conduit, and in these installations there is a specific need for a reconfigurable junction box assembly that can be used specifically with non-metallic conduit. Whereas with metallic conduit a primary consideration is achieving good metal-to-metal contact between the various portions of the junction box, for non-metallic conduit important considerations include ease of use and proper construction to achieve a rainproof junction box. Additionally, the various portions of the multi-position junction box for non-metallic conduit should include features that enable them to be manufactured at low cost per unit.
There thus exists a need for a junction box assembly that is capable of connecting to a network of non-metallic conduit and which junction box assembly can eliminate or reduce the need to store many multiples of configurations of what is essentially the same device to meet a variety of installation needs.